SF Bart Police Shutdown Cell Service to Prevent Protest

Can't believe that they did this, is this even legal? Below is the link to the article. If they can do this here, you know they have the power to do this anywhere. This is scary when they take this kind of action against freedom of speech and assembly. Understand that it might have been on private property, but what if there was an emergency and 911 needed to be called.

Article Link

I don't care how the words are contorted to sugar-coat the situation. This is some Orwellian bull#.

The simple fact that people were able to protest just fine long before cell phones came to be, this article smells a little bit funny to me.

Well, whether or not it smells fishy, at least there were precautions taken to make sure people don't disrupt "business as usual". After all, people need to work to put food on the table and some people happen to take Bart to get to work.

Google ..Cell Phone Jammers
They are in use in Restarunts and many other places like theaters.
Your phone dosent ring and when you try to call out you have no signal
Is this a violation of your rights also ?
Or peace and quiet without phones ringing while you eat or watch a movie ?

I'm more concerned that this move is going set precedent moving forward with any type of civil unrest or protest here in the United States. Soon, before you know it anytime people want to get together to protest anything this tactic will be used to disrupt the assembly and make it more difficult for the people to use the 1st Amendment.

My question is what if this was on public property? Would the police still have the right to do deploy this tactic?

Originally posted by granpabobby
Google ..Cell Phone Jammers
They are in use in Restarunts and many other places like theaters.
Your phone dosent ring and when you try to call out you have no signal
Is this a violation of your rights also ?
Or peace and quiet without phones ringing while you eat or watch a movie ?

that's exactly right, where does your right to talk loudly on your phone, over the movie , cross over my right to listen to the movie that i paid for. or your right to talk loudly on your phone when i'm eating a meal in a restaurant, that i paid for.

when i ran my repair business, and i was dealing with a customer who's phone rang, if they didn't shut it off, or answer it and tell them they would call back, but instead just started talking, i would just walk off and go back to work, and wait for them to finish their conversation, and make them wait for me to come back. my time is as valuable to me as yours is to you.

now back on topic, in this situation the police made a good choice. it was made to keep a volatile situation from getting out of hand. i'm no lover of law enforcement, but i don't label every cop as a jack boot thug. i think it's about 50/50 for cops, 50% doing their job and 50% being jack boot thugs. and having a tool that enables them, being able to stop people who are just at some event to cause trouble, from calling others to reinforce their numbers, was a pretty smart move.

we see it time and time again, when groups gather to protest, they do not attack government buildings, they attack their own communities, private owned businesses, that they can steel from. it's not about injustice it's about what can i steel.

now if they would attack the police stations, court house, city hall, and state and federal buildings that would be something different.

Originally posted by Vinadetta
I'm more concerned that this move is going set precedent moving forward with any type of civil unrest or protest here in the United States. Soon, before you know it anytime people want to get together to protest anything this tactic will be used to disrupt the assembly and make it more difficult for the people to use the 1st Amendment.

My question is what if this was on public property? Would the police still have the right to do deploy this tactic?

i refer you to the post made by Katilani

The simple fact that people were able to protest just fine long before cell phones came to be, this article smells a little bit funny to me.

if it is a legitimate protest, the organizers should make appropriate counter messures to ensure that they can contact who ever needs to be contacted. we have gotten by fine up until about lets say forty years ago with out cell phones. there are ways to make contact with out cell phones.

I have a feeling that the riots in London are going to put a terrible chill on protesting through out the world.

Now all protesters are going to be seen as "agitators" and "punks", and will enable governments to use the excuse to clamp down on protests to "protect the public good" even if they are mostly peaceful. The UK talking about clamping down on the Internet scares the stuffing out of me.

Here's the thing, I know someone that says he was coming home from work, and he was herded into a small room with about 40 other folks, and LOCKED IN. He didn't know what was going on - he was just being compliant and had no idea they were going to be locked in and left like that.
There was no cell service so they couldn't CALL anyone. Someone finally let these folks out.
I am trying to get with him so I can get this written up. He's not much of a writer.